jeez.

I’m suggesting that you go to the next step. When you have a critical mass of viewers (and that is an important element of this) assign them to make a story with you. Better yet, have them help you decide what that story would be. Part of the power you have will be to mobilize. What kinds of stories could you get with a collaborative crowd that you couldn’t do on your own, no matter how hard-working the reporter?

@MelleG I agree - I see Ledger live more as a video blog than a newscast. I don’t plan on giving all the details of any given story - people can just click on the text version of top news items - but to give a snippet and tell them what and why they should check out. And we’re breaking the whole thing up as much as possible on the blog page, so if people don’t want to see my face, they can just watch the videos separately.

I thank everyone for their criticisms and comments. This kind of back and forth is going to be crucial for us.

@Jeff Jarvis I didn’t mean to set up anyone versus anyone. Getting people to participate on local issues is essential for local news and taking the lead can bring some great stuff. For example, asking people to shoot video’s (or write posts/comments) about a certain topic will get a focused view while still getting a broad perspective. Not having a focus will just bring a cacophony of voices, surely democratic but hardly watchable.

But before tossing out Local TV news because your old stomping ground has discovered video, I’d suggest there is more to be considered here and I do so on my own blog, which is reachable by clicking my name.

Just this week, there was a traffic accident in my DC neighborhood. An SUV lost control, flipped over, and hit four parked cars, totally demolishing one of them, a VW. There were three people in the SUV and two take off. The SUV may have been stolen…but at its core this is just a routine traffic accident and not the point but I need to set the stage a little. A local blogger is on the scene early enough to help the SUV passengers out of the flipped over vehicle.

The local blogger writes about the accident on his blog and publishes a photo of the damaged vehicles. Today, one of the people commenting on his post was the owner of the wreck VW. He was writing from Europe and, course, lamented about how it just unsettled his pleasant vacation, while also asking if anyone was interested in VW Golf parts. How did he learn of the accident? The police, possibly, a neighbor perhaps, or the local neighborhood listserv, which has about 2500 subscribers, and were notices of muggings, lost cats, etc., are posted. He could be a subscriber.

But I thought it was interesting that someone in Europe would learn of his wrecked car this way. Nice little headline: Man on vacation in Europe sees his wrecked car on local blog .. or something like that. I would have made a little story out of it if I worked for a local newspaper. But the point is that these neighborhoods in DC and most urban areas are incredibly neural and so connecting with them, I think, will yield enormous rewards that Jeff suggest.

1 A longtime beat reporter going through property records to find all the people who bought properties from the Mayor’s girlfriend. Some records were shoddy and the reporter worked cultivated sources to track down more.
2. Knocking on all their doors at all hours of the day and night
3. Talking your way into those doors and convincing some scared and reluctant people to tell us their stories that put very powerful people in a negative light.
4. Writing and reporting the story; then convincing the subjects to be interviewed on video
5. Shooting and editing the video on a 24 hour deadline.

I don’t know about you, but I’m not seeing a lot of that type of journalism on Youtube, or even on TV, especially on the local level. And it was our second day. Thanks, and
stay tuned.

Who is going to sit down and watch a minicast? People used to the supper hour news who’ve migrated to the web? Like Not Impressed, I honestly don’t see a reason to watch something like this.

It reminds me of a recent discussion I had with a TV reporter over whether the one-minute reported television item was dead, a format created to suit and serve an earlier era, or whether the one minute report — like perhaps the novel — was useful enough in and of itself to live on into the new age of communications.

She seemed to think it was. I, on the other hand, was not convinced. And that’s a bit how I feel about this minicast. Imagine you’d never watched the news before and ask yourself if you’d choose to watch this.

i had the great opportunity to visit the “miss geico” racing team at a venue in MI this past weekend. the folks putting on this event happen to be from(hint to the fine folks at the star ledger) new jersey… “the jersey boys” and geico has pluncked down a heap of change on the fastest boat out there. (there’s word that geico will be making a huge push into the michigan market next year to write insurance on rv’s boats, bikes, jetskiis (aka ‘lake lice’), etc. and what better way to advertise than to underwrite an event like this?

btw- the geico boat is more like an aircraft that flys at the water level around 190mph.

they stream it all online (complete with color commentary), too. see: supercatracing.com

not only is that advertising $$$ that are not making into the paper or on tv, they are broadcasting the stuff (LIVE) to their worldwide audience.

just like the tv v. newspaper debate though, i’m sure there are those who’d rather trash the product these guys are putting out instead of watching their livings flash before their eyes.

Now, newspaper people will be able to prove to TV people that they know local better by providing insightful and informed takes on local issues.

But how this be effectively local can this be and not turn off audiences who have no interest in their suburban neighbors? Regardless of what we write here, the most important metric will be the audience metrics. What will audience traffic rise and fall on? I can easily see the newspaper drifting into a TV news type model as experience with its audience increases. They will no doubt watch how traffic responds minute by minute.

That said, the bottom line is the bottom line and hopefully, the newspaper can build enough traffic for it to turn into a profit center for supporting news gathering.

I guess I could also have chosen Janet Streeeeet Porter’s Network 7, the BBC “Def II” Reportage Show and also the first version of “BBC News 24″ all of which were presented “live from a newsroom”.

John Craven’s Newsround went to CSO after the initial trial run.

BBC News 24 had to dump the hacks in short-sleeves from something more BBC, and much less colourful. OId people couldn’t take it, apparently.

The Dutch NRC-next newspaper is experimenting with videos as well but seemingly clueless. Just some artsy stuff and cookingspecials but no news whatsoever. The videos are even on a completely different domain and scarcely linked from the main sites.